Currently...

On The Needles: A Birthday Party dress for Harper!

Cooking: Chili, Cornbread, Artisan Bread, Spaghetti, Creamy Salsa Chicken (recipe below), Homemade Peanut Butter Cups for my sweetie for Valentine's Day!

Reading: Driven by Eternity (small group), Crunch Time (Diane Mott Davidson is probably one of my favorite mystery writers), Killing Lincoln (just getting into this one, loaned to me by my Father-in-law).

Listening: Adele station on Pandora.

Enjoying: This post about a replacement for picnik since it is closing down! :(
Encouraging post about marriage.

I really need to get planning Harper's first birthday party! It is only 10 days away and I haven't done a thing other than make a pin board on Pinterest!

And battling a cold, no fun! There was a day when I was the person who never got sick...now that I have kids I feel like I am always coming down with something!

Creamy Salsa Chicken in the Crockpot
6 Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts
1 jar of salsa, whatever temperature you prefer
1 8oz container of cream cheese, cubed

Spray the inside of the crock pot bowl with cooking spray and place chicken breasts in bottom. Top with cream cheese cubes and pour the jar of salsa on top of that. Cook on low for 6ish hours. Shred the chicken and cook another 30 minutes to let all the sauce soak into the chicken. Serve in tacos, over rice and beans, or in homemade taquitos! Yum!

Currently

Working on: Wool Longies for baby Beckett. Magic Loop method for knitting two legs at once.

Reading: Driven by Eternity by John Bevere. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins.
Cooking: Cheeseburger Salad. The name sounds a little weird but it is worth a try. It was delicious!
Baking: Artisan Bread from this book.

Frosting!

What is the best part of baking? Baking something that requires frosting, of course! And what is the best part of making frosting? Licking the beater(s)!

Avalyn loves to help in the kitchen, we recently made some frosted brownies to take to our favorite firefighter and his crew. She helped measure the ingredients and of course was a great help with the cleanup!

 

(10/28/11)

Giving Thanks #4

Good friends and good food.

Had a nice time last night catching up with some old friends over pizza and dessert.


Pizza Dough
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp sugar
2 tsp salt
1 envelope (2 1/4 tsp) pizza crust or RapidRise yeast (I think they are probably the same)
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 3/4 cups warm/almost hot water

I use my Kitchen-Aid mixer with the dough hook and it turns out great. You can also do this in a large mixing bowl with a big spoon and strong arms. Add all ingredients to bowl in order, stirring vigorously. Set aside to rest five minutes, and then stir again for three to five minutes.
Add additional water or flour to achieve a smooth, sticky dough. Dough should pull together into a ball.
Divide into two pieces and place each one into an oiled freezer bag OR oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Allow to rise at room temperature and then punch down.
Dough can be refrigerated or frozen now. If you are ready to eat, roll each piece out onto a pizza pan allow to rest a few minutes. Prebake for 10 mintues at 450 degrees F and then put toppings on pizza crust and return to oven for 10-15 minutes until cheese melts. (Makes 2 thicker crusts, you can easily make thin crust pizza just by splitting the dough into more pieces.)

Blueberry Apple Crisp
Fruit Filling
2 cups blueberries (can use frozen, just thaw first)
3 cups peeled, cored, sliced, diced apples
3 Tbsp sugar
3 Tbsp flour

Mix fruit filling together and place in a 2 qt baking dish.

Crisp Topping
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 cup butter

Make crisp topping-Combine dry ingredients in medium bowl and then cut in butter until you have coarse crumb texture. Cover filling with topping. Bake at 375 degrees F for 30-40 minutes. Best when served warm and with cream over the top. :)

sick but eating well

We've been a bit under the weather this week and are starting to feel better.

I will have more words to share when we are back to full health!

Here are some of the recipes I have been cooking lately...

Caramel Corn for my small group.
Baked Oven Fries for my french fry loving toddler.
Butternut Squash Mac & Cheese for comfort. I added a few modifications but if you have never made your own mac & cheese, this is a great recipe to start with. I love being able to use whatever cheese I have on hand and usually a blend of a few kinds of cheese.
Oatmeal Cookies for my small group.
Biscuits for Biscuits and Gravy. I use 50/50 whole wheat and unbleached white flour for these and they turn out great.
Mint Brownies for dessert with family and leftovers served to small group. I use my brownie recipe with the whole wheat substitution.

Apparently sweets are my specialty. Actually we are trying to wait as long as we can before turning on the furnace and baking is a great way to warm up our chilly house in the morning!

I also made 2 more ear flap hats. I need to stop but it is a great stash buster and maybe eventually I will start selling them and then I can buy more yarn....

Fall Quinoa Pilaf

I made this for dinner last night and it was so delicious and pretty too! It paired well with grilled steak and green beans with a small salad on the side. You can easily eat quinoa as a main dish or with a small amount of meat mixed in and it will really fill you up.

I should have taken a picture but you will just have to make it to see for yourself- the golden quinoa, the orange potatoes, the deep red cranberries and light brown of the toasted almonds make it beautiful!

We love quinoa here at our house and if you have never had it before, I highly recommend it. Some information on quinoa is here and here.

Fall Quinoa Pilaf from Cooking4Real
1 cup quinoa
1 T. olive oil
½ cup chopped onions
2 cloves garlic, minced
½ cup dried cranberries
1 small-medium sweet potato (¼-inch diced)
½ cup slivered almonds
salt to taste
freshly ground pepper

Bring 2 cups of water to a boil. While water heats up, toast almonds in dry pan on stove. Add quinoa to boiling water and cook for 12-15 min. until tender.

In frypan on medium heat, sauté cranberries, onions, garlic and sweet potato in olive oil until lightly carmelized. Transfer quinoa to a large mixing bowl. Gently fold in cranberries, sweet potatoes and almonds, Season to taste with salt and pepper.

favorite brownie recipe

My favorite brownies right now...

I am not a food photographer...

This recipe doesn't take any longer to mix up than a box of premixed brownies and I think it is so much tastier. I use half whole wheat flour and half white flour and I really like the texture that results. This last batch I added some chocolate chips before I baked them and they were great! I think they would also be good with a rich chocolate buttercream frosting. Because you can never have too much chocolate in my book. I mix them by hand too, no mixer is necessary and would probably be too much.

Here's the recipe:

Annie's Brownies
1 cup melted butter
1/2 cup cocoa powder
2 cups sugar
4 eggs, beaten
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup white flour
1 cup chocolate chips (optional)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Whisk together melted butter and cocoa powder. Add in sugar, eggs, vanilla and salt. Stir well and then add flours on top. Stir in flours and try not to over mix. Pour batter in a prepared* 9x13 pan  and top with chocolate chips if desired. Bake for 25-28 minutes.
*butter your pan by wiping the pan with the butter wrapper or line with parchment paper

ENJOY!

My (current) favorite recipe

I have made this recipe 2 times in the past 3 weeks and doubled it so that we would have lots... I figured I better share this recipe with you!

Oat Waffles
Yield: 8 servings
Prep and Cook Time: 5-15 minutes (it depends on how many kids you are keeping track of)

Ingredients:
1 cup flour ( I usually split this between white, whole wheat, and wheat bran)
1 cup oat flour (grind up oats in your food processor)
4 tsp baking powder
1 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups milk
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:
In a bowl, combine the first six ingredients. Combine the eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla in a separate bowl and stir into the dry ingredients until just combined. Pour batter into preheated waffle iron and bake according to manufacturer's directions until golden brown.

When I double the recipe it makes enough for us to eat that day and then I keep the extras in the refrigerator. They last us about 4-5 days and if we don't eat them all by then I throw them in the freezer. When we want to eat them leftover we just pop them in the toaster and they are great. Much healthier, I assume, than Eggo's! Sometimes we just top them with honey or peanut butter but they are also great with syrup, eggs, and bacon on the side!

Enjoy.

Baby-Led Weaning

I recently read the book, Baby-Led Weaning by Gill Rapley and Tracey Murkett. I enjoyed reading their ideas on getting your baby to eat solid food. With Avalyn, our first kiddo, I made all her purees and we were pretty cautious on what we gave her to eat. We did the typical starting on rice cereal and then moved on to bland foods and gradually added more flavor and sweet fruits too. We didn't really know there was another way  nor did we really do a whole lot of research. With Harper, our second kiddo, who is almost 6 months now I happened to read a blog post about letting your baby eat more of what you are eating and I was quite intrigued. I started doing a little bit of research and was led to this book.
The basic idea is that purees really teach your baby how to swallow, not how to eat. Letting your baby eat whole foods that are cut into finger sized pieces if necessary will help teach your baby how to chew and feed themselves from the beginning of their solid food experience. I think this is such a great idea. We were still in the habit of cutting all of Avalyn's food into tiny bite-sized pieces at every meal and it never fails, she stuffs a whole handful of tiny bite-sized pieces into her mouth at once and many times starts gagging or has to spit it out (lots of fun at mealtime at our house).
After reading this book we started giving her more strips of food instead of the little pieces and after a few days of trying this she is getting much better at handling a large piece of food and taking bites on her own. We feel much more comfortable with letting her manage her food by herself now. She didn't really understand the concept of taking one bite at a time before and now we feel like she is starting to understand that.
I understand why the authors chose the title but I think the book may miss some of its target audience because it has weaning in the title, perhaps a more appropriate title would have been Baby-Led Solids.
We will be starting Harper on solids in the next few weeks and are really looking forward to letting her experience food the same way that we do and not steamed, bland, mushy purees.
I highly recommend this book if you are looking at starting your baby on solids soon or just care about what you feed your kids.
You can also check out their website if you like and they have a forum too.